


My Heart Is Yours

by warqueenfuriosa



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Drama, Fluff, Gen, Gender Neutral, Other, Reader-Insert, Romance, Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-02
Updated: 2017-12-02
Packaged: 2019-02-09 12:08:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12887559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/warqueenfuriosa/pseuds/warqueenfuriosa
Summary: Poe and Reader fight regarding Poe’s recklessness, and this time, it results in a break up. But when Poe returns bloodied and bruised from an assignment, the one thing on his mind is to make things right with Reader again.





	My Heart Is Yours

“So…” Poe said, tentatively. “Any idea how long you’re going to be mad at me for this time?”

I didn’t respond and slapped the bacta patch in place on his forearm. He flinched, biting his lip to hide a grimace. I flipped the lid of the med kit shut and refused to look at him. We’d had this conversation before, too many times to count, and I was tired of repeating myself. Poe knew my stance already.

“Babe, come on,” he said. “I was lucky.”

“Luck doesn’t last forever.”

“Got back in one piece though, didn’t I?”

I shot a pointed glance in his direction. “Gash on your forearm from wrist to elbow. Two broken ribs. Probably a concussion. I’d say that barely qualifies as one piece.”

“I didn’t even have to go to the med bay.”

“Because _I_ took care of it for you,” I replied, my voice rising too harsh, too fast. “You knew the minute you set foot in the med bay that General Organa would insist you sit still for more than a kriffing minute so you got me to do the dirty work for you.”

“It’s not like that,” Poe said, reaching for my hand. “You always fix me up better than anyone else can.”

But I retreated a step and he let his hand drop to our bed with a sigh.

“We’ve talked about this, Poe,” I said.

Poe stood slowly. Something in his face had changed, from soothing to impatient. “I’m doing my job. It’s part of the deal.”

“No one takes as many risks as you do.”

“It’s my call,” he said, _almost_ through gritted teeth.

An unspoken current ran beneath his words and mine, neither one of us brave enough to cross that line we both knew we shouldn’t.

“You promised me,” Poe said, his voice low, head bowed.

And that was as close to the line as either one of us would dare to go. He was right. I had promised.

 _My heart is yours,_ he told me once in the dark, whispered against my palm with a kiss. _But the Resistance is my home. My family and friends are here. Don’t know if I’m making much of a difference but I like to think if I keep shooting down enough TIE fighters it might count for something._

_Poe, I know the Resistance is important to you. Why are you telling me all this?_

He was quiet for so long that I wondered if he’d fallen asleep. Then he spoke, slow, careful, and quiet, and I knew then that he hadn’t said these words to anyone else except me.

_I never want you to feel like I’m choosing the Resistance over you._

_You might have to occasionally. It’s inevitable, right?_

_Not if I can help it._

I had rolled over to look at him, lacing my fingers with his and pinning his hand to the pillow above his head.

_I’ll never make you choose, Poe. I promise._

“I’m just asking you to be careful,” I said.

“Doesn’t sound like it.”

I crossed my arms, both shielding and bracing myself from the argument and the adrenaline trembling through me like a caffeine buzz.

“That’s not fair,” I said. “I have never suggested or implied or even _hinted_ that you leave the Resistance.”

“Then what are you saying? I’ve come back in far worse condition than this plenty of times and you haven’t made a big deal out of it like you are now.”

“Maybe I should have. Maybe I’m tired of keeping my mouth shut while you tear yourself apart.”

Poe ran his hands through his hair, tugging at his curls with a growl of frustration.

“It’s not easy out there, okay?” he said. The patience in his voice from before was long gone, replaced with the sandpaper scratch of irritation. “I’m doing the best that I can. Sometimes the decisions I have to make in the heat of the moment don’t have a safe or careful choice. You have that luxury. I don’t.”

My eyebrows rose. “What luxury?”

Poe opened his mouth then hesitated and shook his head, turning away. “Nothing,” he muttered.

“Like hell you’re walking away after saying that, Poe. _What luxury?”_

“I meant…” he flung his hand out in a short, exasperated gesture. “I meant that it’s different for you on base.”

“How?”

When Poe didn’t reply right away, I went on.

“Is it because I sit on my ass at a desk all day? Directing, coordinating, and navigating your entire squadron through some of the most dangerous portions of the galaxy? Or how about when your comm goes down after you’ve taken a hit in the middle of a firefight and I get to kick back, prop my feet up. I never realized it was a luxury to worry myself _sick_ because you might be dead out there and I have no way to get to you.”

Poe softened and took a step towards me but I shoved his hand away.

“Don’t touch me,” I spat.

“Babe,” he said with forced affection is if that would diffuse the tension. “I get that you’re worried but I don’t understand why you’re putting me in the hot seat.”

“Because you won’t even allow yourself time to heal!” My voice finally broke, hot tears threatening to spill over. “You’re always pushing yourself too hard and when I ask you to please slow down, take it easy, you act like I’m out of my kriffing mind. I have every right to be mad at you, Poe.”

“Fine, be mad at me all you want. But you know my job is dangerous. I can’t change that.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“Leia doesn’t have a problem with how I handle myself in the field. If she doesn’t care, I don’t see why you have to blow it out of proportion – “

I slapped him so hard my hand burned. His head snapped to the side and a livid red handprint blossomed on his cheek. He blinked in surprise, his protest forgotten and limp on the floor at his feet.

“When your luck runs out,” I rasped, “you can ask Leia to pick up the pieces. I won’t do it.”

***

I didn’t see Poe again until three days later when I returned to our quarters for the first time since the fight. Poe came in as I was packing the last of my clothes. I cast a wary glance over my shoulder then continued stuffing a shirt into my bag.

Poe stopped just inside the door and shoved his hands in his pockets.

“Where are you going?” he said.

“I think it’s best if I had some space for a while.”

A pause so stifling I could barely breathe. Did I want him to say something? Apologize? Would I even believe him at this point?

“You’re taking all of your things,” he said in a voice that sounded strangely distant and hollow, as if he needed to state the reality of the situation in order for it to sink in when he couldn’t grasp what was happening.

“Yes.”

He blew out a breath and scrubbed a hand over his jaw as he stepped forward.

“Look,” he said, “if you want space, I can get out of your hair. You don’t have to go anywhere.”

I closed my eyes, hands braced against the top of my bag. Of all the things he could have said, the offer of making himself scarce was not one I needed to hear.

“That’s not the point, Poe,” I said.

Then the realization hit him. A sharp inhale of breath through his teeth. He rubbed at the back of his neck and a single shock of obscenity sparked from his mouth, vicious with heat.

“You’re leaving,” he said.

I bit the inside of my cheek. The past three nights had been sleepless, staring at the ceiling of a room that wasn’t my own, bargaining endlessly. But when I finally arrived at the one conclusion I had been avoiding all along, I’d cried myself to sleep that night. And I had no more tears to give now, too exhausted, drained, numb.

“Yes, Poe,” I whispered. “I’m leaving you.”

It felt bitter and cruel to specify like that, so blatantly taking a stab in an already raw moment. But I needed to say it, to make sure he knew, under no uncertain circumstances was I questioning my decision. My mind had already been made up.

Poe swallowed a growl and spread his hands. “Can’t we talk about this?”

“How many times have we had this same discussion? Over and over? It doesn’t change. We’ve talked about it enough.”

Poe’s hands dropped to his sides.

“I can’t watch you drive yourself into the ground anymore,” I added softly. “I can’t keep going out of my mind with worry only to have you laugh it off, tell me it’s no big deal. It’s always been a big deal to me. Always.”

I waited, hoping, praying, begging him to say something, anything, and to remain silent, to let me go without a fight in the vain hope it would hurt less.

In the end, I got my wish. He said nothing as I slung my bag over my shoulder and walked out, leaving him in a room full of holes where my presence had been before.

***

As a communications officer, there was plenty of work to keep me busy and I didn’t cross Poe’s path more than once or twice. It was harder to ignore reports of his squadron when half of the base talked about him, but I caught myself listening in anyway.

For the first week or two, I expected Poe to confront me with his dogged determination, refusing to give up and make it work somehow. But he never did and I couldn’t decide if it was better that way or if it only rubbed salt in the wound.

A month later, pounding on my door woke me in the middle of the night. Heart in my throat, I flung the covers aside, the chilly air sending goosebumps shivering across my skin and I opened the door.

Poe stood there, blood streaming from his temple to his chin, his eyes glazed but that familiar fire of stubbornness still burning in his eyes. His breath was wet and rattling in his chest as he braced his hands on either side of the doorway. Standing this close to him, I could see the strain of effort it took to remain upright despite the exhaustion that wracked his trembling body. Automatically, I reached out to steady him then stopped short of touching him.

“Poe, what the hell are you - ?”

“I’m sorry,” he wheezed. “I know that won’t even begin to make things right but I’m…” He squeezed his eyes closed and shook his head, his voice barely audible as he whispered, “I’m so sorry.”

I swayed forward on my toes, imagining how impossibly good it would feel to wrap my arms around his neck, to feel his hands slide around my waist and pull me against him. But I kept my distance. He didn’t look particularly lucid at the moment and he might not even realize what he was saying, let alone mean a word of it.

“You need to go to the med bay,” I said, taking him by the elbow.

“I will.” He placed his hand over the top of my mine and traced his thumb along the inside of my wrist. “I just….needed to talk to you first. To tell you that.”

“All right, well, message received. Now if you would – “

I broke off when Poe’s knees buckled and he sagged dangerously close to the floor. My hand shot out, resting in the middle of his chest, pushing him into a standing position again.

“Stars, Poe,” I said. “You’re practically dead on your feet.”

He grimaced, struggling to pull in each labored breath. “It’s…never enough.”

“What?”

He raised his head and the sheer depth of grief I saw there in his eyes made me take a step towards him.

“Every TIE fighter I take down,” he said. “Every scrap of intel I wrestle out of the First Order’s hands, it’s not enough. There are always more people dying, more calls for back up. It doesn’t stop.”

“But you’re human, Poe. You have to take a break once in a while.”

“I know. _Force,_ I know. You’re right.”

His hand slid from the wall and he slowly sank to his knees. I knelt beside him, his hands resting on top of his thighs, two inches of chasm between us, untouched, despite the way I gravitated towards him and he gravitated towards me. He bowed his head, shoulders curved inward. I’d seen him exhausted before, beaten down, but he always pasted on a shaky smile, fired off a sarcastic quip to show he would be fine.

This time, it was different. This time, Poe wasn’t getting back up.

“I was a kriffing idiot to make fun of you like I did,” he croaked in the direction of the floor.

“Yes, you were,” I whispered.

He let out a dry laugh. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For saying that. Not feeding me some bullshit line about good intentions, my heart in the right place. Just keep me straight and true. You and Leia both. I’ll never get away with anything ever again.”

I frowned in confusion. “Leia?”

“She’s chewed me out three times this week for pulling stupid stunts.”

I hesitated but I dared to say it anyway. “Thought Leia didn’t have a problem with the way you handled things.”

“That was a lie. No other word for it. Just…a lie.”

I raised my eyebrows and opened my mouth to protest but Poe lifted his head, his expression miserable.

“I tried,” he said. “I tried to be good for you. I hated to see the worry steal that beautiful smile from your face.” He thumbed at my bottom lip and his palm drifted higher to rest against my cheek. “So I played it down hoping that would put your mind at ease.”

“Didn’t work out too well.”

He sighed and nodded. “Yeah, I got that much.”

My fingers itched to brush his hair back from his forehead, to find my med kit and piece him back together as I’d done hundreds of times before. As much as he hated spending any amount of time in the med bay, I had preferred to be the one to patch him up, to take inventory of how bad the injuries were and convince myself he would be fine, like always.

Instead, I took Poe’s hands and pulled him to his feet. “Let’s go,” I said. “We’ll continue this conversation after a visit to the med bay, when you’re not on the verge of unconsciousness.”

Poe glanced up at me in surprise. “We…will? You mean…you _want_ to talk more? About this? With me?”

“Maybe. It depends if you continue to be a kriffing idiot or not. So don’t get your hopes up.”

***

Once the painkillers wore off and Poe was clear-headed, I stepped into his room in the med bay. He sat propped up against half a dozen pillows, poking at a datapad, already looking like he was bored senseless. When he heard the door close behind me, he raised his head and his eyes brightened. He shoved the datapad aside.

“Hey,” he breathed.

I tucked my hands in my back pockets. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” he said then added quickly, “But not a hundred percent. I’ll have to hang around here for a few days at least.”

“You mean you’re following doctor’s orders for once?”

He winced. “Terrible habit, I know.”

“Do you want to tell me what happened out there to make you decide it was a good idea to give me a heart attack in the middle of the night?”

He sighed and sank deeper into his pillows, his head tipped back.

“There was a threat,” he said. “To the base.”

“I didn’t hear anything about it.”

“Assigned to my squadron only. Not your department.”

“Oh.”

He rubbed at his forehead. “They almost got through, too. Scared me half to death, thinking they could shoot down this whole base with you in it and I…”

He stopped and simply stared at the ceiling.

“You got a taste of what my life is like, didn’t you?” I finished for him.

Poe closed his eyes. “To think I put you through that every day.”

I pushed a chair up to his bedside and sat, elbows propped on my knees.

“We need to talk, Poe,” I whispered. “You realize that, right?”

He blew out a breath. “Yeah.”

“And _stars_ , if you crack so much as one joke about it – “

“I won’t,” he cut in. “You’re serious. I can see that.”

I nodded and my gaze dropped to my hands, unsure how to proceed. Poe still looked terrible. His skin wasn’t the right color, drained and flat, and despite the little movement he had made, I could tell it pained him by the way he clenched his teeth and didn’t breathe.

I stood and edged closer to his bed. I nudged him in the ribs.

“Move,” I said.

Poe squirmed to the side. There wasn’t much room on the small bed to begin with but I settled in next to him anyway, pressed together shoulder to shoulder, my hands folded across my stomach.

After a minute or two, Poe’s hand inched across my hip and he hooked his little finger around mine. I thought about pushing him away. I thought about insisting on space and distance and time.

Instead, I turned my hand palm up and laced my fingers with his. He brought our entwined hands to his mouth and pressed a kiss to my knuckles.

I rolled over, burrowing into his side as gently as possible. Things were still a mess and a long way from being fixed, but at least he was alive. At least we had a chance.

***

Poe folded his arms across the top of my desk.

“Quick question,” he said.

“One moment, Blue Squadron,” I said then covered the mouthpiece of my comm with my hand. “Now?”

“Won’t take more than a minute.”

“I’m in the middle of coordinating a landing.”

“I know I’m being a pain in the ass. But I’m scheduled for a mission at the top of the hour. Please?” he said with his most charming smile.

I bit back a growl and flicked the switch to transfer the squadron to another comm officer. I pried the headset off, dropped it on my desk.

“All right, what is it?” I said.

Poe drummed his fingers on the top of my desk and looked down the line of officers beside me. He took my hand and drew me into the hallway.

“I was wondering if…you know…I could kiss you. Before I go. Like I used to.”

“You pulled me off the job for _that_?” I said, incredulous.

After several weeks of some tentatively long discussions, things were better but still a little rocky at times. I kept to my own quarters at night and I made sure not one article of clothing or belonging found its way into Poe’s room. He’d already asked if I would move back in with him but I refused on the grounds that I knew Poe wouldn’t change. He would continue to be reckless because that’s the way he was in everything he did, going all out with no reservations. And I needed to come to terms with that on my own time in my own territory, away from him.

Poe shrugged, his smile turning from charming to boyish within the span of a second.

“You’ve always been my good luck charm,” he said. “This is my first day in the field again after two months on the ground and I…”

He trailed off, rubbing the back of his neck.

“You’ve never been superstitious about it before,” I said.

“I may be a little thick-headed at times but I know you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. And that’s about as close to a good luck charm as I’ll ever get.”

“You make it sound like I’m your rabbit’s foot or something. Which is gross, by the way.”

He laughed. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Then what did you mean?”

He ducked his head and his hand drifted over to take mine. “I meant,” he said, his voice pitched low, “that I don’t want you to worry. I’ll be as careful as I possibly can.”

“No, you won’t.”

He raised his head, concern darkening his eyes.

“You’ve never been careful a day in your life,” I added. “You’re not about to start anytime soon.”

Poe studied my face and squeezed my hand until my fingers went numb. He opened his mouth to protest but I continued.

“So you’d better kiss me before you leave. For good luck.”

At first, Poe didn’t move. Then his fingers skimmed my jawline and buried in my hair as he shifted closer. My hand settled at his hip and slid up his chest, tugging at his collar to pull him towards me.

He kissed me the way he lived, all out with no reservations. His tongue swept along my bottom lip and I leaned into him, my fingers curling around the back of his neck. He teased my mouth open and wasted no time in licking across my tongue, a small pleased sound mingled with relief vibrating low in the back of his throat.

He cupped my face in his hands and his teeth grazed my bottom lip as he kissed me harder, sharp and reckless, until I could taste him on my tongue and breathe him in my lungs.

Then I put my hands on his chest and pushed him back, sucking in a gasp of air.

“Go,” I said with another push for emphasis. My composure was slipping as it did every time he was assigned field work but I refused to let him see any sign of tears. “You’ll be late. Go.”

“Could we continue this conversation when I get back?” he said softly.

“Only if you return in one piece,” I said, my voice cracking on the last word.

“I will. I promise.”

Poe caught my hand and pressed a kiss to my palm as he looked up at me, those words he’d told me so long ago echoing in the silence.

_My heart is yours._

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed it! Feel free to pop by on tumblr @warqueenfuriosa


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